Chapter 344. Postwar Measures 2
Next came the handling of prisoners.
In a land short of people, this was one of the most important matters—and one of the most neglected.
Youngwoo established a system for sorting prisoners, keeping them alive, and putting them to use.
First, indiscriminate slaughter had to be stopped.
How many times had he argued with the Jurchens over that?
At the same time, prisoners could provide intelligence and serve as laborers.
Despite strong opposition, Youngwoo also intended to organize some of them into another submitted force, much like the tribal troops of Liao.
Finally, important captives had political value that had to be preserved.
He had already established principles for handling prisoners.
First, disarm them immediately.
Swords, bows, short bows, quivers, daggers, even thumb rings were to be collected.
Armor was to be removed at once, but prisoners were not to be stripped of their clothes and left to freeze.
The purpose was to take away their ability to fight again without allowing discipline to dissolve into plunder.
Second, separate them by status and affiliation.
Liao imperial guards, Han troops, tribal forces, Balhae soldiers, wagoners, supply officers, craftsmen, and clerks were all to be sorted separately.
Imperial guards and captured officers had great intelligence value.
Wagoners and supply personnel knew the routes and locations of depots.
Balhae prisoners might be willing to submit.
Han soldiers might possess information connected to Yanjing and the Song front.
Third, secure officers and documents first.
Commanders, standard-bearers, messengers, clerks, and anyone carrying supply ledgers were bound separately and sent to central command.
Question the man before the horse.
Seal the document before questioning the man.
They were not merely prisoners.
They were living documents from the battlefield.
Fourth, treat the wounded first.
Leaving wounded men where they lay turned the clearing of a battlefield into the work of beasts.
This had been one of the harshest issues Youngwoo had faced.
He assigned physicians and medicine.
Those with light wounds were returned to the prisoner columns.
The gravely wounded were laid separately.
Only by doing so could the Goryeo and Balhae troops trust the discipline of the army.
Fifth, killing prisoners was forbidden.
If captives were slaughtered in anger, their intelligence, labor, and possibility of submission disappeared with them.
Youngwoo ordered that anyone who killed prisoners without authorization be punished under military law.
The captives were not herded into a single mass.
Liao imperial guards stood with imperial guards.
Han troops with Han troops.
Tribal soldiers with tribal soldiers.
Balhae soldiers were called out separately.
Wagoners, supply handlers, tent crews, and horse handlers were gathered into their own groups as well.
To the eye, they were all defeated soldiers.
What they knew, however, differed greatly.
Imperial guards knew the emperor's movements.
Messengers knew how orders had flowed through the army.
Supply officers knew the locations of depots and wagons.
Youngwoo said,
"Separate the commanders, messengers, and anyone carrying supply ledgers.
"Seal all documents and official seals and send them to central command.
"Send the Balhae soldiers to General Go Hoewon.
"Assign interpreters to question the Han troops.
"Lay down the wounded first and give them water."
So Cheolryong approached with a bloodstained spear in hand.
"Do we keep alive even the ones caught while running away?"
Youngwoo looked at him.
"Yes.
"The dead say nothing. The living can tell us the roads, the depots, and the location of the next camp.
"What we need today is information, not heads."
At those words, the Goryeo and Balhae troops around him began to move.
Spearmen formed a perimeter around the prisoners.
Men behind them brought ropes and bound hands.
Physicians selected the groaning wounded and laid them to one side.
Horse handlers separated captured mounts from riderless horses.
Clerks took out damp brushes and began writing in ledgers.
Little by little, the battlefield changed from a place of death into a place of military work.
Some excited Jin soldiers approached the prisoners.
Some had lost family members.
Some had endured years of humiliation under Liao rule.
Others had been fighting for their lives only moments before.
The heat of killing still remained in their eyes.
Youngwoo ordered the gong struck again.
Clang.
At the sound, the Goryeo soldiers raised their spears first.
The Balhae troops formed beside them.
A thin but unmistakable line appeared between the Jin soldiers and the prisoners.
Youngwoo spoke in a low voice.
"Cutting down a bound man earns no merit. It is a violation of military law.
"Prisoners belong to the Great Khan. They are intelligence for the army and people who can be used for what comes next.
"You settled your grudges on the battlefield.
"From this moment on, military law governs."
His voice was cold.
Cutting down an enemy who was still fleeing and killing a prisoner whose hands were bound were two different things.
Youngwoo drew that distinction clearly.
That line was what separated an army from a mob.
Several Balhae prisoners raised their heads.
Go Hoewon studied them for a long moment.
They wore Liao uniforms, but traces of Liaodong remained in their speech, their faces, and their names.
Youngwoo handed them over to Go Hoewon.
"Listen to what they have to say. Open a road for those who wish to submit. Separate those who insist on following Liao to the end."
The Jin soldiers who received the order bowed deeply.
"We will do so."
Once the principles for handling prisoners were established, the atmosphere of the battlefield gradually settled.
The dead were buried.
The living were bound.
The wounded were laid down.
Horses, wagons, and provisions were entered into the ledgers.
That was how Youngwoo placed victory under military law.
Chapter 345. The Great Khan's Summons — Dragged Away by Zonghan and Zongwang
The Great Khan sent for him.
Not once.
A messenger came.
Then another.
Then a third.
A banquet had been prepared to honor the hardships of the battle.
The senior commanders of Goryeo, the submitted Balhae leaders, and the chiefs of the various tribes had gathered there.
It was a place to celebrate the victory at Hubodagang together and reward distinguished commanders with meat and wine.
Youngwoo, however, remained at one side of the battlefield.
A large tent had been raised there, with tables and seats arranged in front of it while documents piled up around him.
Soldiers ran back and forth with reports.
Clerks brought up written records.
Before him rose heaps of torn tents, bundles of silk, silver vessels, saddles, weapons, pieces of armor, and sacks of provisions.
Youngwoo stood with clerks, carpenters, smiths, and recovery teams before him, giving instructions one by one.
"Separate the wet silk from the dry.
"Shake the dirt from the stained pieces and hang them to dry.
"Use the torn cloth for tents. Bundle the intact silk separately.
"Separate decorated silver vessels from those to be melted down.
"Stack lamellar plates of matching shape together.
"If the leather on a saddle is still sound, repair it.
"And do not throw away a single piece of iron, no matter how small."
The battle had ended.
For Youngwoo, another battle had begun.
The Jurchens had possessed so little that Liao men mocked them as paupers.
There had not been enough iron plates for armor.
Even farming tools were scarce enough to make working the fields difficult.
To such people, one discarded spearhead, a handful of lamellar plates, a horse, or a length of silk meant money, resources, and capital for the next war.
The emperor himself had taken the field.
It was almost as though the entire Liao palace had crossed the plains and collapsed there.
The imperial carriage, tents, silk, silverware, horses, cattle, weapons, and provisions had spilled across the roads.
If men were allowed to carry away those valuables as they pleased, they would disappear into drinking money and belt ornaments.
If the army collected, sorted, repaired, and recorded them, they became grain and armor for the next campaign.
That was exactly what Youngwoo was doing.
Another messenger from the Great Khan arrived.
"Commander Yi, the Great Khan summons you."
Youngwoo answered without looking up from the ledger.
"I'll go in a little while."
"This is already the third summons."
Youngwoo gave him a sideways smile.
His face turned toward the messenger, but his eyes remained fixed on the ledger.
"Then I'll go on the fourth."
The messenger left with a troubled expression.
One of the clerks stopped his brush and looked at Youngwoo.
Youngwoo calmly pointed toward another bundle of silk.
"That needs to be dried now. If the night dew gets to it, its value will be cut in half."
Before long, Wanyan Zonghan came in person.
He dismounted and strode straight toward Youngwoo.
"Why are you not coming?"
Youngwoo looked up.
"Ah, I'm a little busy."
Zonghan looked around.
Silk, tents, silver vessels, and weapons covered the field.
Sorting meant placing each kind in its proper section while clerks recorded everything.
Soldiers arrived carrying recovered goods, asked where each item belonged, and set them down.
Laborers then arranged them into order.
"Can't this sort of thing wait until later?"
Youngwoo immediately picked up two bundles of silk.
One had been dried neatly and tied with cord.
The other had been trampled through dirt, blood, and hoofprints until its color had changed.
"Look at these.
"This one can be sold as it is.
"This one has to be shaken out, dried, and sorted before the end of today.
"Leave it overnight and it will only be good for tent cloth.
"The difference between the two is worth several warhorses."
Zonghan looked at the silk, then at Youngwoo.
"Ah, you really are…"
"I'll come in a little while."
Zonghan twisted his mouth into a faint smile.
Commander Yi worrying about wet silk before answering the Great Khan's summons was absurd.
And somehow, that made Zonghan like him even more.
"Couldn't you simply show your face for a moment and come back? The Great Khan is waiting for you."
"I don't fit very well in gatherings like that. There are plenty of people who can take my place.
"Lord Kim is there. General Park is there. General Zongwang is there…"
At that moment, Zongwang arrived.
He shouted from a distance,
"Who is throwing my name around?"
Youngwoo gave a small laugh.
Zongwang jumped from his horse.
"Why aren't you coming?"
Youngwoo flinched.
Zongwang's movements were rough.
He certainly had no intention of attacking him, yet everything about the approach looked aggressive.
The moment he landed, Zongwang marched straight over and seized one of Youngwoo's arms.
"The Great Khan has sent for you several times. Now we have come ourselves."
Youngwoo tried to pull his arm free.
Zongwang's grip was like an iron clamp.
Youngwoo had trained in grasping techniques himself, yet he could not move the arm at all.
Somehow the man was absurdly strong.
Before he knew it, Zonghan had taken the other arm.
"Come on. Let's go."
Youngwoo twisted his body toward the ledgers.
"Ah! Wait, the ledger… We still haven't entered the number of horses.
"And those silver vessels need to be divided between decorated pieces and ones to be melted down.
"The wet silk over there has to be dried first.
"And those lamellar plates need to be sorted by size…"
Zongwang roared with laughter.
"Tell the Great Khan all of that at the drinking table. He'll like you even more."
Zonghan laughed as well.
"The ledger is not going anywhere. The Great Khan's table is already set."
Youngwoo urgently shouted toward the clerks.
"Wet silk first!
"Documents and seals to central command!
"Mark the horses!
"Sort the lamellar plates by size!
"Set aside the shares for the wounded and the families of the dead first!"
The clerks bowed together.
"Understood!"
Zongwang and Zonghan dragged Youngwoo away between them.
Even while being hauled off, Youngwoo kept looking back.
"Do not leave numbers out of that ledger!
"Wagons with sound wheels first!
"Don't step on the silver vessels!
"Do not sit on the silk!"
The Jin troops, Goryeo soldiers, and Balhae men around them all burst into laughter.
This was the man who had broken into the center of the emperor's army only hours before.
Now he was being dragged away by both arms while shouting about a length of silk, a single lamellar plate, and a line in a ledger.
Zongwang laughed and said,
"Commander Yi, the Great Khan is calling you there to honor your achievements in battle."
Youngwoo answered with an aggrieved expression.
"If you want to honor achievements, shouldn't we secure them before they disappear?
"All of that is merit.
"The horses are merit.
"The silk is merit.
"The armor plates are merit."
Zonghan nodded.
"That is exactly why the Great Khan insists on having you there.
"A man who wins the battle and then turns the spoils into money is rare."
Youngwoo paused.
"Now that you put it that way, perhaps I should go after all."
Zongwang immediately tightened his grip.
"Not perhaps. You are going now."
And so Youngwoo was dragged off to the Great Khan's banquet.
It looked less like the triumphant escort of one of the heroes of victory and more like two commanders arresting an overworked quartermaster who refused to let go of his ledgers.
Everyone watching understood the reason Youngwoo had resisted.
He had not been trying to secure a greater share for himself.
He was trying to turn everything won that day into strength for the next war